Donald Trump’s rally are a hotbed of bigotry, and that was proven at his latest event in Rock Hill, South Carolina. A Muslim woman, Rose Hamid, 56, attended, and she says she had some predictably horrific encounters before Trump’s goons finally threw her out for no reason other than the fact that she is Muslim. Speaking to CNN’s Don Lemon, Hamid said:

“One guy was saying, ‘Get out — do you have a bomb? Do you have a bomb?’ I said, ‘No. Do you have a bomb?’ They were saying ugly, ugly things. One guy was saying, ‘God is great.’ I said, ‘Yeah, God is great.’”

Though Hamid wore a shirt that expressed peaceful intentions, she and another man were escorted from the event by a police officer. To make matters worse, Trump himself seized the opportunity to stoke the fires of hate and bigotry in his ignorant base, saying as they were removed by a cop:

“There is hatred against us that is unbelievable. It’s their hatred, it’s not our hatred.”

Hamid summed the experience up perfectly when she told Don Lemon that Trump’s repeated Islamophobia and hate speech is “a vivid example of what happens when you start using this hateful rhetoric and how it can incite a crowd.”

Lemon asked Hamid what most folks would ask a person who goes into a lion’s den of hate deliberately:

“Some people would say, ‘Why even put yourself in that position, Rose? To be around those people.’”

Hamid’s response was one of wisdom and bravery:

“Because I don’t want to think of them as ‘those people.’I think that’s what the problem is, that we look at people and we categorize them as ‘those people’ who are bad people and ‘these people’ are the good people. I believe that people in all camps are decent people as we get to know them.”

Well, she has more faith in humanity — and especially in Donald Trump supporters — than I do. Hopefully, on some level, Rose Hamid is right and I am wrong.

Author: Shannon BarberShannon Barber is a self- described queer feminist and activist for racial equality, LGBT rights, women’s rights, and secular rights in America. She is a lifelong lover of words, though her educational background is in computer science. She currently writes for 2 liberal websites, and keeps her own humor blog for lesbians. She hopes to change the world, one mind at a time.